Missing Indiana boy found in Minnesota, 19 years later

January 10, 2013|By Ryan Haggerty, Chicago Tribune reporter

Richard Wayne Landers Jr. just before he disappeared in 1994. (Indiana State Police photo)

Richard Wayne Landers Jr. was 5 years old when his paternal grandparents allegedly abducted him in northeastern Indiana in 1994 and the three seemingly vanished, frustrating detectives for nearly two decades.

But Landers, who is now 24, has been found alive and well in Minnesota, where he is married and uses a name that his grandparents gave him after they abducted him, the Indiana State Police said Thursday.

His grandparents, Richard E. and Ruth A. Landers, live about eight miles from him and have been using aliases since the abduction, said Sgt. Ron Galaviz, a spokesman for the Indiana State Police.

Federal prosecutors and county prosecutors in both Minnesota and Indiana are reviewing the case, Galaviz said.

"The fact of the matter is he's been found alive and well," the spokesman said. "There's a lot of policemen here in LaGrange County (Ind.) and the family here in LaGrange County who are awfully excited because 19 long years have come to an end."

Landers' stepfather, Richard Harter, said he and Landers' mother, Lisa Harter, learned Wednesday night that her son had been found.

"It's happened so fast, and we haven't talked to him yet," said Richard Harter, who lives in Indiana. "We are planning on it. We're going to as soon as we can."

Richard Harter declined further comment and referred additional questions to the family's attorney, who could not immediately be reached.

Landers' grandparents "were allegedly upset over pending court proceedings regarding the placement of their grandson" when they abducted him on July 29, 1994, and disappeared from their home near Wolcottville, Ind., according to a news release from the Indiana State Police.

The case was stalled for years until September 2012, when Landers' stepfather gave a state police detective the Social Security card that had been issued to Landers before he was abducted, Galaviz said.

Detectives eventually found a man living in Long Prairie, Minn., who was using Landers' Social Security number and date of birth, the spokesman said.

Police in Minnesota, as well as the FBI and the Social Security Administration, began looking into the case.

Authorities eventually found Landers' grandparents living under aliases in Browerville, Minn., Galaviz said.

He said the couple confirmed their true identities to investigators and verified that the man using Landers' Social Security number and date of birth was their grandson.

Soon after the abduction, authorities issued arrest warrants for Landers' grandparents charging them with interference with custody, a misdemeanor, according to the Indiana State Police. The charges were upgraded to felonies in 1999.

But in 2008, prosecutors decided to drop the charges because neither Landers nor his grandparents had been found.

Galaviz said he did not know whether the grandparents are in custody in Minnesota. The sheriff of the county where they live declined to comment and said his department would issue a news release Friday.

Galaviz also did not know how much knowledge, if any, Landers has of his past.

The spokesman described Landers as "well-adjusted."

"It just appears that (his grandparents) took him out there and they raised him as their own son," Galaviz said.

Landers will have to decide if he'd like to reunite with his mother, Galaviz said.

"Being a young adult now, that's going to be up to him," he said. "We can't force him and say, 'Now you're going back with your mom.' He's 24 years old."